Pressure mounts for cease-fire in Syria

Wednesday

Feb 29, 2012 at 6:00 AM

By Neil MacFarquhar and Alan Cowell THE NEW YORK TIMES

A day after a referendum on a new constitution and amid sustained violence, Syria came under renewed international pressure from a long list of governments urging an immediate cease-fire and warning that Syria’s leaders would not escape accounting for their actions.

Navi Pillay, the United Nations’ top human rights official, told a meeting of the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday that in the face of “unspeakable violations that take place every moment,” Syria should be referred to the International Criminal Court.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, speaking at a Senate hearing Tuesday, said in response to a question that “there would be an argument to be made” that President Bashar Assad is a war criminal based on the definition of crimes against humanity. But, she added, the label “limits options, perhaps, to persuade leaders to step down from power.”

Her remarks came as a senior official in Tunisia said on Tuesday that the Tunisian government, which took power after a popular uprising ousted the president last year, would be willing to offer asylum to Assad, who has so far dismissed calls to step down.

The call for an immediate cease-fire from members of the Human Rights Council did not go beyond similar calls by other international groups in recent weeks. But diplomats and world leaders have been hoping that a drumbeat of intensified criticism might pressure Syria’s government to stop its relentless crackdown on its opposition.

As diplomats decried the continuing bombardment of the city of Homs, family members of a wounded photographer from Britain, Paul Conroy, who had been trapped in the city, said he had been able to escape to Beirut overnight in circumstances that were unclear. The whereabouts of Edith Bouvier, a French journalist who was injured in the same attack Wednesday in the Baba Amr neighborhood of Homs, were unknown.

Although President Nicolas Sarkozy of France said Tuesday that Bouvier had been freed, a short time later his office said it was “not yet able to confirm” her evacuation. The French Foreign Ministry also said it had “no confirmation” that Bouvier had been rescued.

Reuters reported that government forces continued shelling Baba Amr and began bombing an opposition stronghold in Hama province north of Homs as well. Beleaguered neighborhoods of Homs have been under sustained attack for almost 3-1/2 weeks.

“We’ve just had word from Beirut. I’ve got it on the other phone in my other hand,” Conroy said.

The British government offered no immediate confirmation of the rescue.

Peter Bouckaert, a representative of Humans Rights Watch, said in a Twitter post that reports saying Bouvier was in Lebanon were false.

In Paris, Bernard Valero, the French Foreign Ministry spokesman, told reporters: “We have no elements at this stage which allow us to confirm what has been published by certain media. No confirmation concerning the situation of our compatriot.”

There was no word on when the bodies of two other journalists killed in Homs last week — war correspondent Marie Colvin, an American who, like Paul Conroy, worked for The Sunday Times of London, and Remi Ochlik, a French photographer — might be evacuated.